Category Archives: mediadropping

Symbiotic processes

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A blogpost over at the main Miraculous Agitations blog introduces two very different projects I recently contributed to. One of these projects is titled Project Symbiosis, and, as it happens, the process of symbiosis forms the underlying theme of that blogpost (which is prefaced by a meditation on perceived ‘impossibilities’ pervading acts of promotion in my own recent wrigglings).

Project Symbiosis is a CD+booklet curated by Brighton-based audiovisual artist/author/filmmaker/circuit-constructor Ian Helliwell. It contains ten different interpretations of the same graphic score, including the original recording by the score’s composer, Malcolm Pointon. The exploratory score, Symbiosis, was published in Practical Electronics magazine in 1975 as an exercise in electronic music-making, intended to be realised on a ‘Minisonic’ synthesiser – its circuit also published by the magazine a year earlier. A supplementary booklet gives details on all the different versions (available via Public Information). I supplied a microtonal version of Symbiosis.

From the experimental to the (nominally) chart-bound: this year I was given the opportunity, to paraphrase David Cronenberg’s Videodrome, to patch myself back into the world’s mixing board of humanity by reworking a radio-friendly track about human relationships (whatever they are), entitled ‘Floundering’ by musician and sound artist Kalou aka Samuel Shelton Robinson. It appears on Kalou’s new album The Sculpture Garden, idealised as a cassette release (but also available as download). Kalou’s output ranges from postmodern experimental montage to quirky pop, zested with neurosis. The Sculpture Garden is Kalou’s most commercial release, and it rather obscures its creator’s deeper interests in offbeat sound engineering.

Ian Helliwell, and surprisingly, Kalou too, touched upon issues of visibility, audience engagement and ‘undergroundness’ on two separate broadcasts on Resonance FM last month, on William English’s Wavelength.

Trolling in the Material World – In Defence of Noel Edmonds

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The etymology of the the term ‘trolling’, as applied to the internet, is interesting.  Once, it referred to ‘playing the fool’ anonymously.  Over time, the ‘fool’ became an ‘upstart’.  To my mind, it once seemed to be a label for acts of what could be called elongated reciprocal interference, ostensibly unprovoked, but arising from microscopic/imagined discomforts of perception (hence reciprocality).  Today it is something unmentionable.  Trolling might involve leaving abstract comments on forums which would steer conversational threads towards the ridiculous.  However, in the last few years, the term ‘trolling’ has now been used by the UK press to refer to anonymous hate emissions designed to cause maximum offence.  In the US however, this hate-emission is termed ‘flaming’.  ‘Flaming’ is a suitably malign word to use, whereas ‘trolling’ retains a rather benign character, quite at odds with the viciousness it often refers to.
According to today’s press reports, popular TV personality Noel Edmonds recently hired a detective agency to track down the creator of a small Facebook group entitled “Somebody please kill Noel Edmonds”.  Bizarrely, it was found that the creator of this group was a PhD student.  Rather than informing the police, Edmonds contacted the student’s campus to request a face-to-face meeting with the troll, who subsequently apologised – the troll-intent short circuited.  Elsewhere, it was reported that Edmonds also offered to fund a special PhD to investigate the phenomenon of internet trolls and the motives behind trolling.  It is certainly a fascinating research topic.  I’d kill (metaphorically) to have such an opportunity…
Today is April 1st.  The significance is pronounced.  Indeed, there is no immediate evidence that this “kill Noel Edmonds” Facebook group ever existed (although evidence of a Midlands punk zine titled Kill Noel Edmonds crops up on Google).  Time will tell whether the Noel Edmonds story is true, but at the moment, the fizz of uncertainty propels thoughtfulness.
Solar Fictions; A free inquiry into the received astronomical
doctrine and popular opinions concerning the sun
Trolling has been around since time immemorial in the form of general hoaxing, literary frauds, Interventionist Art, etc.  It is glimpsed in the imp of the perverse.  The Situationist Guy Debord published his 1959 artist book Mémoires with a sandpaper cover, to gradually destroy adjacent books or polished surfaces.  Elsewhere, in literature, one undermentioned and particularly strange pseudonymous book titled Solar Fictions by ‘A Freeman’ seems to qualify as religiously motivated trolling of sorts.  This sarcasm-laced 1871 publication sought to pooh-pooh rationalism, discredit all scientific endeavour, and ultimately disprove the existence of the sun (its cover shows the sun being extinguished with a candlesnuffer).  These two things are just random examples.  One might condemn Solar Fictions as woefully misguided anti-astronomy, or the sandpaper of Debord’s Mémoires as inconsiderate gimmickry, but both possess honest artistry in their elaborate conception… There is actual thought-content.
As technology makes it easier to produce throwaway emissions, flippancy creeps in.  And with flippancy is the inclination toward bluntness; the shedding of any remaining responsibilities; the artistry disappears.  In the audio cassette’s heyday, a hoaxer named John Humble created tapes where he claimed to be responsible for the Yorkshire ripper killings.  These were anonymously posted to the police.  Queasily, one tape featured Andrew Gold’s pop hit Thank You for Being a Friend.  It was easy for Humble just to hit record and spill out his guff.  Now, with the internet, the potential for agitational flippancy is astronomical.
My own mediadropping projects (especially the targeted varieties) had a touch of that same ‘imp of the perverse’ which informs some of the more lightweight examples of modern trolling, and also its incoherent sister, crapflooding.  Domineering local personalities were targeted with self-made soundstuff – physical media such as CDs and cassettes were deployed.  Mediadropping is specifically a sonic affair characterised by confusing, abstract and possibly enlightening elements.  The certainties of small-town prejudice and mediocrity were confronted head-on with semi-worrying anti-mediocrities (often, paradoxically, mediocre).  Artistic attempts were made to diffuse dumb malaise with some finely crafted agitation.
Things get stupidly unjust if the roles are reversed.  If bullish people try to make their own mediadropping, all abstractness with its gentle mystery is thrown out the window.  The results are uninteresting, and often plainly derogatory (murderousness unadorned), negating all artistry.
If the Noel Edmonds story is true, did the trolling PhD student reckon Edmonds to be a figurehead of mediocrity?  Did he resent the concept of mediocrity and take out his directionless angst on Edmonds?  If so, the aspiring doctorate-holder has atrocious judgement and rotten imagination (besides, Edmonds has already been ‘trolled’ in a rather more imaginative drama setup by Chris Morris).  Aside from the moral murk of inciting murder, even jokingly, there is something utterly wrong about targeting Noel Edmonds in the context of trolling.  Edmonds himself is a skilled channeller of the ‘imp of the perverse’; see, for instance, his NTV segments on Noel’s House Party – where spy cameras were fitted onto a random viewer’s television set, to be switched into the live feed on Edmonds’ command.  Shocked viewers would suddenly see themselves on national television, and Edmonds would attempt to communicate with them whilst in their shocked state.
If today’s story about the Noel Edmonds troll does turn out to be an April Fool, then may this post collapse upon itself tidily.  If not, then may these points be scrutinised with heightened seriousness.

UPDATE 18/01/12:  It appears the Noel Edmonds troll story is true after all, and not an April Fool’s fabrication.  If Edmonds or any of his retinue are reading this, vis-a-vis the hint in the above text, I’d be unbelievably keen to embark on a PhD in the origins of trolling, its cultural ramifications, etc., but I have no money…  My own theory is that trolling instances rise in tandem with the decline of alleged ‘poltergeist’ activity – as the same motivation underpins both, and the internet offers the path of least resistance.  I’ve been begging for PhD funding (in a wide range of fields) since 2007.

Tapedropping – Cassette Culture, Mediadropping Musings and the Decline of Audio Pamphleteering

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Tapedropping: For Thee…

It is frustrating to find that audio cassettes are now obsolete.  I say this not out of nostalgia, but because cassettes were the ideal medium for mediadropping (that is, anonymously leaving homemade music in random places).  Indeed, prior to the manifest decline of the cassette in around 2004, I referred to mediadropping as tapedropping.  The neologism mediadropping came later.

Available here is a paper entitled Mediadropping Musings detailing the practice and philosophy of mediadropping / tapedropping.  The essay formed part of a larger collection which were often dropped likewise in acts of pamphlet-dropping.  This particular text is reproduced here with all its original faults, but remains a useful document for any effusionist.

The majority of people no longer own equipment to play cassettes.  This practice of mediadropping is now almost completely thwarted by lack of suitable media.  CD-dropping was experimented with, but CDs can also carry data.  I have conducted wide-ranging dropping experiments using both CDs and tapes bearing email addresses in order to harvest responses.  CD-droppings have low response rates.  There is perhaps a sense that CDs can carry computer viruses or even just potentially *too graphic* multimedia experiences.  This makes people loath to pick up a rogue CD-R, even if enticing cover art is provided.  Cassettes, in contrast, are obviously meant for audio – tapes are mysterious Pandora’s boxes which rouse curiosity concerning their content.

Tapedropping: Bad Trad

In recent years, tapes have become ‘cool’ again for their retro appeal in niche circles.  These people who maintain the tape mantle are, however, too knowing to be targeted as tapedropping recipients.   The ideal audience for tapedroppings are just ever-so-slightly leftfield of the middle-of-the-road, but generally uncaring shits – the very people who have now migrated from tape to the latest invisible mp3 zapping technology.  It is a shame.

My own early tapedroppings were anything but ‘cool’.  They were rabid affairs characterised by an element of ‘trolling’ (before the word came to represent foul cyber-desecrations of basic human decency).  Early tapedroppings were directed at aggressors, muse-stiflers, intimidatingly dull bastards, etc.  Often, the tapes smacked of puritanical fanaticism and stoic exhortation against the utterly arrogant sexual mores of tacky, brutish schoolboys.

Tapedropping ‘music’ is rather like a personal individualistic manifestation of what used to be called “rough music” (see E. P. Thompson’s chapter in Customs in Common for an excellent overview).  ‘Rough music’ involved a “rude cacophony” produced by sections of the community to mock or wind up certain persons who had transgressed community norms.  Tapedropping is rather rough music’s reversal, in that it is generally directed back at the community norms.
Rough Music in Warwickshire, 1909
During schooldays I was keen on the concept of thought-vengeance.  A perceived injustice should always be repaid by an anonymously deposited cassette containing specially tailored semi-musical, sonically-distorted composition-rants, all creatively fuelled by the bitterly energising gall-whisk of futility.  Often, these ‘injustices’ didn’t even involve me – for instance, when a quiet boy was kicked downstairs by fourth-formers known to me, I would enact a tapedropping vengeance on the victim’s behalf.  An agitating listening experience would be dispensed, timed in such a manner that it wouldn’t be attributed to myself.
Regrettably, many of the early cassettes were unique – no other copies existed other than the master copies deposited for their intended recipients.  I recall most of the audio-pieces were noisy affairs (turning the air many shades of blue – on tape) intended not only for bully-types, but also those unwittingly cruel ‘casual-bullies’ whose demotivating throwaway remarks were more potent than sustained targeting due to their ‘coolness’.  Cassettes were left in their desk drawers, lockers and in their shoes during gym lessons, among other places.  To effectively irk the deserving targets, it was necessary to give the impression that the cassette originated from somebody much older.  An intricately constructed soundscape was also needed to give the impression that considerable effort had been expended on the article.  Overt obnoxiousness was withheld, pitches were lowered and efforts were made at robust articulation.  Even more effective was the inclusion of the target’s own voice (distorted and made ridiculous through processing) which I might surreptitiously capture on a portable dictaphone during breaktimes and lessons.  On one occasion I gained access to the French teacher’s cupboard where she stored tape recordings of every pupil’s spoken assignments – all the pupils’ names alphabetically arranged.  This was fantastic sonic material.  Later, I would obtain information to weave into lyrical matter by creepily browsing records in the school office (obtaining information such as home addresses and parents’ professions) and phoning the parents from phone-boxes to extract information or to record their voices for later processing.

Special instruments were built from soft drink cans, bits of wheelbarrow and the cord found in the waistbands of elasticated trousers. The more confusing sounds produced, the better.

I noticed that these tapedroppings could bring about changes of behaviour in their targets.  Beholders of rogue cassettes loudly voiced their concerns over the following days, playing detective to fathom the origins and purpose of the strange anti-gift.  Answers were never forthcoming, but gossip and false information were: “Mr. Foulsham made that cassette because he hates your mum”, etc.  Generally, a few weeks after receiving the cassette, the recipient became softer and less liable to abuse quieter people – a good thing.  The effects weren’t so lasting on dyed-in-the-wool bullies, but certainly the ‘casual-bullies’ became more pleasant.

 

Countless tapes were deployed, but I tried to avoid targeting the same person twice or thrice.  My philosophy was that you only get one chance at this kind of operation, so it had better be a good one!  If a recipient were to receive a second tape, he would be more mentally prepared and its potency would be lost.

At some stage it became apparent that certain combinations of sounds, voice information, treatments and ‘instrumentation’ were more effective at affecting a target than others.  Catchiness of chant or melody was certainly potent.  Without referring back to a master tape, it was impossible to judge what compositions were the most successful.  Until this point, I had been recording directly to cassette using my parents’ hi-fi and dubbing extra tracks by using the second tape deck.  At a car boot sale around 1998, I obtained a four-track, so I began constructing ‘stock’ backing tracks, leaving space for different voice dubbings each time to be tailored for the specific target.  The four-track machine enabled the re-use of certain flights of sound combinations and the retaining of copies.

With age comes maturity, and with maturity comes the unlikelihood of honest puerility. This makes these targeted ‘mediadroppings’ even more discordant, thus memorable, for the recipient.  Aged eighteen, whilst most of my fellows were desperately trying to cultivate some kind of misguided competitive strut, I thought it to be the perfect time to puncture their fledgling pseudo-poise with tapes of ever-sophisticating dispensation.  Tissue-box zithers were strung with extra strings.  There were persons whom I had not yet repaid for past aggressions upon me, some stretching back years.  At this time, CD-Rs were becoming popular, so the sonics took on a digital slant.  With CD-Rs there is the aforementioned problem that the media itself can be mistaken for computer data, thus requiring a printed sleeve to indicate that it is indeed a ‘harmless’ audio CD.  Some printed sleeves featured voyeuristic grainy digital photographs I had taken of the targets from some distance.  These personalised sleeves created such a furore (with incredible near-tearfulness) throughout the sixth form common room that I desisted from this particular graphic quirk, as it seemed to detract from the audio content which should be the focus.

At college, a more altruistic route was taken with the tapedroppings.  I reverted back to cassette and randomly made tapedroppings on a near-industrial scale all around public places.  I mainly strove to create an interesting listening experience for random people who happened to stumble across the tapes.  Encouragement was also given in the supplementary sleeves for the random recipient to create his/her own sonic deployments.  I wanted to hear what other people were sonically capable of when all obligations to follow musical trends were discarded.  Crucially, an email address was provided on the tapes.  Email allowed for recipient feedback, and many responses were harvested this way.  With catalogue numbers on each cassette, the recipient could be asked to cite the number, and thus the actual material would be identified and subsequently honed further and further toward the most reaction-eliciting sonics.

The document Mediadropping Musings highlights the various shades of severity in tapedropping sentiment.  I have divided these into three categories: Subdued, Burlesque and Wayward.  The dangers of ‘wayward’ mediadroppings are also detailed therein.  Without the surreal, artistic, fantastical, incoherent and abstract elements, mediadropping can be hijacked by the aforementioned “dull bastards” who may use anonymity to extend their bullydom and make comically sick provocations to strangers.  This is what we see happening online with the ‘unacceptable’ face of ‘trolling’.  It is vital, therefore, that the mechanics of mediadropping are understood in order to “troll the troll” in attempts to restore equilibrium where possible.  In the digital age, it is, sadly, difficult to coerce people to play unsolicited audio from an unknown web source.   Here’s hoping a new physical audio format suited to mediadropping may emerge in the future!

The Voynich Manuscript – An Acoustic Interpretation

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The baffling Voynich Manuscript, written in an apparently indecipherable script, has caused much head-scratching since its rediscovery in 1912.  Thought to be of mediaeval origin, it contains quasi-astrological diagrams, depictions of strange devices, plants – unlike any earthly flora – alongside nude figures bathing in complex networks of ‘pools’ featuring recycled water (some mechanisms of which look decidedly unhygienic to modern eyes).  Some reckon it to be an alchemical text, whilst others believe it a hoax or an artistic exercise in glyptolalia.  Judge for yourself here.

One intriguing set of theories proposed by H. Richard SantaColoma speculate upon its possible representation of Sir Francis Bacon’s New Atlantis, specifically Solomon’s House – its college.  For this, it must be assumed that the manuscript was written in the early 17th century (or slightly earlier depending on the actual conception of the New Atlantis utopia) albeit on 15th century vellum (as carbon dating has proven).  The optical activities of the ‘Perspective Houses’ along with the grafting of diverse plants are considered as being represented within the manuscript.  However, if this theory is true, where are Solomon’s House’s famed ‘Sound houses’?  Could the ‘sound’ chapter have once comprised the now missing excised 32 pages?

Sonic activities in Solomon’s House, New Atlantis

These theories are inspiring to contemplate.  There are so many conflicting ideas vying for consideration surrounding the Voynich manuscript that it wouldn’t do much harm to throw in my tuppence worth, as far fetched as my following speculation may *sound*…

It seems that nobody has yet considered the Voynich Manuscript entirely in terms of acoustics.  Does the whole manuscript in fact concern sonics?  Admittedly, at first glance it would appear that sound or music is entirely absent, but to those acquainted with cymatics a possible avenue of investigation reveals itself.  (This may be a cue for some people to stop reading any further, especially for those who stand by the old adage “all comparisons are odious”).  In the tradition of Daphne Oram‘s bravura sonic speculations, tentative explorations can be made with this acoustic angle.

In the 1880s, the singer Margaret Watts Hughes developed a technique of producing 2D organic forms on a flexible membrane strewn with a fine powder, a la Chladni’s plate (but with the singing voice as the agitator).  The membrane was stretched over a sounding chamber with a pipe connected to it, through which Hughes would sustain tones, varying in timbre.  Upon the membrane, plant-like and fern-like forms were made by steadily moving the eidophone membrane over paste-covered glass, in effect creating a recording.  This technique produced entire gardens of sorts.  In 1891, Hughes wrote “(…) day by day I have gone on singing into shape these peculiar forms, and, stepping out of doors, have seen their parallels living in the flowers, ferns and trees around me; and, again, as I have watched the little heaps in the formation of the floral figures gather themselves up and then shoot out their petals, just as a flower springs from the swollen bud”.  Could the Voynich manuscript depict eidophonic activities?

A Voynich ‘rosette’

In the 20th century, Hans Jenny coined the term ‘cymatics’ to refer to the basic visible-sound phenomena.  Jenny used piezo-electric agitation, and also employed water-filled plates (although producing forms in liquids with only the voice would be very difficult – requiring acute volume and pinpoint pitch).  However, many of Jenny’s most iconic cymatic figures were produced by electronic oscillators operating in the kilohertz domain – above vocal range.

Eidophones

Throughout the Voynich manuscript, ‘sprays’ and ‘streams’ can be seen issuing from bizarre pipes.  The wavy streams are evidently liquids of some sort, although the sprays are more incongruous.  The technique of producing fine sprays from liquids was proposed by Bernoulli in his 1738 book ‘Hydrodynamica’ and was only perfected in the form of atomisers in the mid 19th century.  Some of these spray emissions in the manuscript seem to defy gravity, ruling out powder sprays.  Are these sprays early representations of sound?  It’s worth mentioning that the now-discredited corpuscular theory of sound was ‘in the air’ since the 1620s.

On page 77 of the manuscript, five ‘elements’ are illustrated issuing from a pipe manned by figures at each end.  The figure on the right has an apparent emission towards or from the mouth.  Does it represent the formative powers of sound?  There are other suggestions of this power, such as in the ‘rosettes’ fold-out where buildings are seen emerging from the primordial patterns.  Also, the majority of the figures shown throughout have their mouths in an ‘O’ shape hinting at voice production.  The images of ‘bathers in pools’ may actually depict naked choirs all sounding the same resonant note, crowded inside large resonant drums and cavities sending their voices through tubes to membranes, upon which large voice figures figures may be produced.  Their nudity might be due to the fact that clothing absorbs sound, whereas skin (especially if wet) is more reflective of sound (performers today note that acoustics of rooms alter when an audience is present) thus preserving resonance.

The manuscript’s astrological charts show some similarities to cymatic figures.  The charts showing improbable spiral forms may indicate motion, as the combined voices of the singers would be rife with rich phasings (chorusing) which would translate as an unstable, moving cymatic figure, with manifest rotary motions.  The symbolic demarcations of some charts might be attempts at macro/microcosmic integration by corresponding the limbs of voice figures with astrological houses.

The chorusing, that is, the cumulation of pitch and tone discrepancies in a choir voicing the same note, would create ‘blurred’ unstable voice figures.  Maybe the vase-like devices shown in the final section of the manuscript are Helmholtz resonators, or Vitruvius’ urns, tuned to enhance/amplify the purity of the tone?  Furthermore, were membranes stretched over the mouth of these ornate resonator urns?  (H. Richard SantaColoma suggests these devices shown were not resonator urns, but early microscopes).

If an eidophonic system is depicted, the manuscript’s exotic plant forms may derive from species of cymatic/eidophone voice figures.  But this begs the question as to why the plants are coloured – as any particle-based eidophone figures would certainly not be colour specific.  Of course this is all an extremely tenuous speculation.  All natural forms have harmonic characteristics (most notable in phyllotactic patterns) and are thus potentially translatable into sound.  Besides, there’s scant historical record of any such vibratory practices occurring in antiquity, and certainly none this elaborate.  However, it may be remembered that study of natural phenomena was strictly forbidden for centuries in Christendom, and beyond.

Resonators?

The likeliest theory is that the Voynich manuscript is a fantastical piece of systematised confusion: a dreamscape of pure flummox, maybe of hallucinatory origin.  The style was even expertly pastiched by Luigi Serafini in his 1981 masterpiece ‘Codex Seraphinianus‘ – a monumental oddity of glyptolalia.  Imagine randomly finding a book so utterly odd it can only be assumed to originate from another planet.  Incidentally, this is surely the touchstone of mediadropping!

As a footnote, the woodcut a few paragraphs above showing a New Atlantis ‘Sound House’ appears quite a lot online, and is often said to originate from an old imprint of New Atlantis.  It may go some way to show how easily we may be deceived by forgings of period styles, as, after some research, it transpired that it’s in fact a pastiche of 17th century engraving created by 20th century U.S. artist Lowell Hess.  It’s from a 1970 book titled ‘Graphic Design for the Computer Age’.

UPDATE 22/10/11: H. Richard SantaColoma has pointed out that the ‘rosettes’ fold-out page of the Voynich Manuscript most likely depicts a map, perhaps detailing the various departments of the House of Solomon.  Here, a candidate for the Sound House is identified in the top left hand corner.  He draws attention to the pointed loudhaileresque tubes, seen both as an extended pentad on the Sound House, and in shorter clusters surrounding the central House of Solomon.  It can be seen here.

The Philosophy of Mediadropping podcasted, and the history of "planking"

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‘The Philosophy of Mediadropping’ show mentioned in the previous posting is now available online as a podcast here.

Mediadropping is the random public dropping of home-made media which is peculiar in some way, with the intention of eliciting a reaction from whoever finds and plays the media.

I have often wondered if an old mediadropping was responsible for the phenomenon of “planking”: where photos are taken of people lying down in unusual places and circumstances.  In March 2005 I had compiled a CD-R mediadropping extravaganza, bearing various mp3s, images and random text files of quantum physics and variations on the Heisenberg uncertainty principle.  Its intention was to flummox.  One directory, titled “The Fallen” contained a dozen photos of persons lying unexplainably prone.

One of these images, for example, taken around February 2005, featured Resonance FM’s Richard Thomas on the floor of 9 Denmark Street (the old station offices) clutching a drumstick, seemingly staking his claim as a pioneer of this art.  A rare and remarkable thing, this was seen as a radical nugget to be experimentalised as mediadropping fodder.  It should be noted this was before the UK “planking” craze of 2009 – after which time it was picked up by the tabloids and divested of its mystique, and, as such, would from there onwards be seen as being perhaps a bit infra dig (as least, to those already acquainted with the practice before it ‘sold out’).  Today’s “planking” bandwagon-chasers mostly appear to be people mucking about, often dangerously.  But these pre-craze 2005 mediadropping photos exude a profound honesty, a “professional strangeness” – an artistic integrity, if I may be so pretentious – which modern day attempts entirely fail to capture.

I can provide evidence of perhaps the earliest instance of “planking” (or, “the lying down game” as it’s also known).  I am certain that “planking” can be linked to a general mediadropping tradition… In 1995 I made several photographs showing the “lying down” phenomena – some school friends I persuaded to down their clipboards during a school trip.  Duplicates of these were made to accompany mediadropped cassettes from 1995-96.  This was before Radiohead’s video for ‘Just’ (showcasing epic “profound lying down”), and also predates the alleged invention of the “game” in 1997.  Of course, it completely precedes Robert J. Sawyer’s 1999 novel ‘Flashforward’ (curiously, also encompassing quantum physics in relation to “profound lying down”), the US TV adaption of the same name, and ‘This Morning’ hosts Phillip Schofield and Jenni Falconer popularising the “lying down” and trashing it up still further earlier this July.

The Philosophy of Mediadropping – ResonanceFM, 17th June, 4pm

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As part of Resonance 104.4FM‘s broadcasts from Raven Row, a show I produced, voiced by Will Luscombe (of the exquisite Luscombe’s Choice), will be aired on Friday 17th June, entitled ‘The Philosophy of Mediadropping’.

‘The Philosophy of Mediadropping’ is a relentless musing on the practice of mediadropping – the dropping of home-made CDs, DVDs, tapes, books, manuscripts, etc. in public places for random people to find.

Mediadropping is a pathological habit of mine.  My old Resonance show, ‘The Exciting Hellebore Shew’, documented many mediadroppings in detail (or tapedroppings as I referred to them back then, as cassette was the weapon of choice).  Special ‘music’ was consigned to cassette or CD-R and scattered hither and thither.  Over time, an instrumentarium was built up specifically geared toward sonically shocking unsuspecting mediadropping recipients.

Mediadropping may be seen as a physical analogue of the ‘crapflooding’ and ‘trolling’ phenomena of the internet age, but this is a debatable comparison to be treated in a later posting here.  In the meantime, tune in to catch ‘The Philosophy of Mediadropping’ and hear Luscombe’s voice fed through a sawn-off trolley and a garage door.  Feel the cassette-grot erode your tolerance threshold.